For years, Nvidia has been making graphics cards for two gaming categories. The Santa Clara-based company has built beefy graphics chips for the desktop that push out bleeding edge visuals on PC. But when it comes to laptops, Nvidia has… Continue Reading →

For years, Nvidia has been making graphics cards for two gaming categories. The Santa Clara-based company has built beefy graphics chips for the desktop that push out bleeding edge visuals on PC. But when it comes to laptops, Nvidia has made comparable chips with the same architecture, but the constraints of the platform has forced the company to tone down the power.

That ends today as Nvidia has announced that it has created gaming notebook versions of its new graphics cards based on the Pascal architecture. In essence, the GTX 10-series, which includes the GeForce GFX 1060, GeForce GFX 1070 and GeForce GFX 1080, are coming to laptops in their full glory. The move promises a big boost in power when compared to the notebooks with the 900M chips.

Being a full-fledged Geforce GTX graphics chip with no compromises, players can expect the same type of features on notebooks as they would on PC. Laptops with GTX 10-series of chips will handle virtual reality and support G-Sync. Some OEMs will ship notebooks that include SLI built in. That’s the feature that lets two Nvidia graphics cards connect to each other to push higher frame rates and lusher visuals. There will even be an option for factory overclocking.

Part of the reason, Nvidia has been able to replicate its graphics card in a smaller form factor is that it has included dual-FET power supply and increased energy efficiency with multi phased power controllers. Despite being more powerful, Aevermann says the GTX 10-series chips get 30 percent more battery life compared to the Maxwell notebook predecessors.

Aevermann says players can expect to see notebooks with the GTX 10-series chips launching Tuesday with the most affordable models featuring a GeForce GTX 1060 selling for $1,300.

Whenever there’s fierce competition in the marketplace, it’s consumer that wins. Take the world of graphics card at the moment. The two dominant forces are AMD and Nvidia, and both companies have been pushing the envelop trying to one-up each… Continue Reading →

Whenever there’s fierce competition in the marketplace, it’s consumer that wins. Take the world of graphics card at the moment. The two dominant forces are AMD and Nvidia, and both companies have been pushing the envelop trying to one-up each other when it comes to the latest graphics cards. AMD released its Fury X to compete with Nvidia’s 980 Ti, and the two are comparable with one doing better in certain resolutions than the other and vice versa.

But one element that is overlooked is the software side. It’s the extra features and how the company uses the hardware and tunes it to each title that often makes the difference. In the case of Nvidia’s GTX 950, the company is upping its game, and MOBA players and Twitch broadcasters should pay attention. With the launch of its newest graphics card, Nvidia is releasing even more specific drivers designed to improve performance for popular multiplayer online battle arenas such as League of Legends, Dota 2 and Heroes of the Storm. These are meant to lower the latency between a mouse click and what players see on the screen.

In a demo, Thomas Petersen, Nvidia’s distinguished engineer. showed off the benefits. The GTX 950 performed admirably compared to the older GTX 650. The visuals were sharper and the framerate was more consistent. During hectic battles, the game never dipped below 50 frames per second on the 950, giving players a smoother experience.

That’s to be expected, but what’s more impressive is the optimization that makes titles such as Dota 2 more responsive. He said the improvements the team made shrinks the render time and whereas the GTX 650 saw a 80 milliseconds response time between click and action on the screen, the GTX 950 slashes that almost in half to 45 milliseconds. That split-second often is the difference between getting that last hit on a mob and getting experience and losing that opportunity.

Right now, that low-latency optimization is only available for the GTX 950, but Nvidia intends to release it for its other cards.

The second improvement Petersen revealed is a feature called Share. It will replace Shadowplay, a GeForce Experience program that let users record gameplay and stream but wasn’t used that often, according to the engineer. The Share is a essentially an upgrade to that and offers four ways to display your gameplay videos to the world — instant replay, record, broadcast and stream.

The Instant Replay, Record and Broadcast are all self-explanatory. Instant Replay lets players record up to 30 minutes to an hour of gameplay. From there, players can edit it, pare it down and upload that footage quickly to YouTube. Record does a similar thing, but it saves the data locally. Petersen said both options are better than the built-in DVR of Windows 10 because it has a low overhead when it comes to impact on processing power and it can capture 4K video at 60 frames per second.

Broadcast lets players stream on Twitch. There isn’t much customization to the layout. The program is fairly barebones, but it is serviceable.

The more interesting element of Share is the Stream option, which lets players make a peer-to-peer connection with a friend through a Chrome browser. All players have to do is send a buddy an email and the link inside it will open up a window via a Chrome extension. It lets a friend see what you’re playing and they can offer tips on a particularly tricky section or commentary on gameplay.

Things move to the next level though because in addition to commenting over the peer-to-peer video, players can hand over control to the friend watching and she can actually manipulate the game from her computer or laptop. There’s even an option to do co-op if the game supports it so that you and a buddy can be playing together via the stream. Think of it as the PC version of the PlayStation 4 Share Play.

Keep in mind, this wasn’t done out in the wild. It was demoed in a controlled environment, but I wonder how fast an Internet connection needs to be to make this work effortlessly. From what I saw, it looked lagless. It was almost as if the second player was in the room with me.

It’s one of several impressive feats that could nudge consumers looking for a new graphics card toward Nvidia’s side.

There was a time when Apple and Google were allies. The iPhone once used Google Maps as its default direction-finder and YouTube sat prominently on the homescreen. But that kind of harmony has fallen to the wayside as the Silicon… Continue Reading →

There was a time when Apple and Google were allies. The iPhone once used Google Maps as its default direction-finder and YouTube sat prominently on the homescreen. But that kind of harmony has fallen to the wayside as the Silicon Valley giants have become rivals on several fronts. They have competing Web browsers (Safari vs. Chrome) and smartphone operating systems (iOS vs. Android). In this epic tech battle, there’s a new front opening up — the third screen.

That’s how Ali Kani, general manager of Nvidia’s Shield division, describes this emerging space. The first display was the personal computer and that technology revolutionized the second display, which is mobile phone. Now, it is television’s turn to change with the help of the computer chip, and Apple and Google are both jockeying for position to offer the most attractive device. At Google IO, the company offered a fuller glimpse of what it is doing with Android TV. It’s going to push the platform on a wider array of products such as TVs and standalone devices.

Nvidia sees an opening in this fight for the living room. It already caters to a tech-savvy audience who has already cut the cord and streams content to TVs. With that in mind, the company known for making bleeding-edge graphics card has decided to make a device that not only satisfies users media-consuming needs, but also their gaming needs. That’s the thought behind the Nvidia Shield Android TV.

Once a PC exclusive, The Talos Principle will launch first on Nvidia Shield before it hits consoles.

I had a chance to check out the device and came away impressed with the utility of what Nvidia calls “The flagship of Android TV.” It packs serious horsepower with the Tegra X1 chip and is the only box at the moment that will stream 4K Netflix content. If you have one of those new ultra high-definition monitors in your living room, this is a must-buy. The Nvidia Shield will show off that sharp picture and it can even run some of that content at 60 frames per second as long as it’s done via internal memory.

Aside from the 4K support, the big draw for the device is that it is close to being that all-in-one system that can access all the services cord cutters want. There are Android TV apps for Sling, Netflix, Google Play Music, YouTube and a host of other content providers. But if you can’t find those native apps, users can just stream it via built-in Googlecast. (It’s essentially Chromecast.) For example, Crunchyroll doesn’t have an Android TV app nor does Amazon Video, but it’s easy to stream it from my Chromebook. (Unfortunately, it didn’t work with my iPhone.) Today, Google announced that HBO Now, CBS and Fox Family apps will be available on Android TV. And for those who use antennas to get over-the-air signals, there is support for HDHomeRun, which turns the Shield into a DVR that can record broadcast signals with help of a tuner.

What’s even more impressive is the voice search. Of all the voice-command devices I’ve used, Google’s is by far the best. It often correctly understands what I’m saying and inputs it into the search bar, and it does so intelligently. Say I’m looking for Johnny Depp movies. I’ll say, “Find my Johnny Depp movies” and a lineup of his work appears on the screen with different ways I can watch it thanks to cross-app search. I can ask it to filter the findings to the most recent flicks and it will do that. And like Amazon Echo, you can even ask Android TV how tall Mount Everest is and it will give you the right answer. It’s smart voice search that will help you navigate the interface without slowly pecking through a virtual keyboard.

Hotline Miami is an indie title that’s available on Nvidia Shield. The system also supports a mouse and keyboard, which is the best control scheme for the title.

As for the gaming aspect, the Nvidia Shield offers a plethora of ways to play. Players can access casual or core games through the Nvidia Shield Hub or Google Play Game store. Not all Android games will work on the device. I couldn’t get the puzzle game Threes, which I purchased on an old Android phone, to install on the device.

I tried out Nvidia Grid and the streaming service works great. It was one of the better-than-expected features. The games looked good with some artifacts, and the lag wasn’t bad. I could even play some fighting games such as Street Fighter X Tekken on it. I wouldn’t recommend playing tournaments on the device, but it works well enough for the casual fan.

For those who have one of the latest Nvidia graphics cards, the streaming works decently. I’m not sure if it was my WiFi connection or my PC, but the GameStream functionality wasn’t stable. I’ll experiment with it more later. As for games native to the system, I haven’t had time to play with it much, but from what I’ve seen, the visuals are comparable to past generation of consoles. And best of all, the system allows up to four players and supports multiple control schemes such as a PS4 controller so users don’t have to stick with Nvidia’s stock gamepad or remote.

Nvidia Shield Android TV launches today. It’s priced at $199 for a version of 16GB. The Shield Pro, which has 500GB of onboard storage, costs $299 and includes Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel. The company is also offering a $30 Google Play gift card and a $30 Google Play Music subscription for a limited time.

After last week’s leak, Nvidia’s upcoming graphics card isn’t too much of a surprise when it was announced today. The successor to the GeForce 690 will be called the GeForce GTX Titan, a named title that’s a first for the… Continue Reading →

After last week’s leak, Nvidia’s upcoming graphics card isn’t too much of a surprise when it was announced today. The successor to the GeForce 690 will be called the GeForce GTX Titan, a named title that’s a first for the company. No numbers this time around. The chipset itself is directly related to the Titan supercomputer based at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. The monster machine is ranked No. 1, according to the Top500 and uses Nvidia technology.

When it comes to specs, the GTX Titan boasts 2,688 CUDA Cores and can process 4,500 Gigaflops. It has 7.1 billion transistors. In comparison, Intel’s top-of-the-line Core i7 3960X Extreme Edition chip has 6 cores, runs 316 Gigaflops and 2.3 billion transistors. That’s a lot of performance and with 3-way SLI support that means a system can runCrysis 3 maxed out at a resolution of 5760 by 1080. It’s a ridiculous amount of horsepower. On the other end of the spectrum, the GTX Titan also enables computermakers to design powerful system in a smaller form factor. That’s important as PCs are increasingly becoming appliances that fit in the living room.

Along with the boost in power, GTX Titan will be the only chipset to use the GPU Boost 2.0 software, which makes overclocking much easier than in the past. The previous software was confusing because it tied clock speed to voltage and you’d have to adjust the fan and other variables. This time around, GPU Boost 2.0 ties performance to temperature. It’s as simple as that. You can increase the performance, fan speed and voltage and you don’t have to worry about it as long as the chip stays at a certain temperature. What’s even better is that the GTX Titan includes display overclocking so that you can run certain monitors faster than their advertised speed.

The GPU includes a Vapor Chamber, extended fin stack and advanced fan control.

Even when overclockers bump up the performance, they’ll discover that the GTX Titan will stay quiet. You could barely hear it when Nvidia ran the chip hard. The hotel air conditioner was louder. All that power means that some gamers may have to upgrade their power source units. Nvidia recommends a minimum 500 watt PSU for the GPU and 1.2 kilowatts PSU if you’re going to use the 3-way SLI.

The GTX Titan is available now, but again at $999, it caters to the most hard-core of PC gamers. Those who must have the latest and greatest and fastest PCs need only apply.

]]>http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2013/02/19/nvidia-announces-its-next-graphics-card-the-geforce-gtx-titan/feed/0GeForceGTX_Titan_3Qtr1aCosmosII_and_Tiki-6430-processedGeForceGTX_Titan_3Qtr2aWhy the PC has the best version of Borderlands 2http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2012/09/22/why-the-pc-has-the-best-version-of-borderlands-2/
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2012/09/22/why-the-pc-has-the-best-version-of-borderlands-2/#commentsSat, 22 Sep 2012 12:00:25 +0000http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/?p=24920

With the release this week of Borderlands 2 (here’s my review), the big question isn’t whether you should get it. (God yes, you should.) The query people send me most often is what system should they get it on Xbox… Continue Reading →

With the release this week of Borderlands 2 (here’s my review), the big question isn’t whether you should get it. (God yes, you should.) The query people send me most often is what system should they get it on Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3. My answer: Pick it up for the PC.

There are several reasons for this:

A) The control scheme. I’m sorry no matter how much they improve controllers, the keyboard and mouse are still the best way to run and gun in a video game. No other scheme is as precise or as flexible.

B) Online play. It doesn’t cost extra and it’s often more stable and faster than what’s on console.

C) This is probably the biggest differentiator. The visuals are better. The graphical improvements aren’t just a higher resolution, better draw distances and textures. They are touches missing from the console games that are part of the PC experience because Gearbox Software uses Nvidia’s PhysX engine.

I did a comparison of both versions showing some of the visual touches. Here’s a quick roundup of what I saw.

THERE’S BLOOD EVERYWHERE: This was the first thing I noticed. On the Xbox 360 when you shoot Bullymongs, they spill out tangerine-colored blood. But it’s not just some static graphical element. The PhysX engine lets the liquid behave like liquid. When I was shooting the monsters on a cliff, the sanguine remains colected and pooled in the rocky crevices. In other words, the blood reacts to the physics of the world, creating a more believable environment. Blood also gushes out when shooting bandits and psychopaths.

BATTLES CAN GET MESSY: After clearing an area of monsters on Xbox 360, the battlefield is clean. All the debris eventually disappears. Blocks of ice melt away. Bullet holes fade. On the PC, all those tiny particles stay. The skirmishes leave areas in tatters, so much so that it looks like a hurricane smashed through an area. Because consoles can’t handle all that debris, console miss out on that chaos on the battlefield. It offers more fidelity to the world.

THERE ARE LESS JAGGIES: Despite being the same resolution, the PC version has fewer jaggies as demonstrated by the above screenshot. Nvidia’s FXAA smooths out the lines in the cel-shading. The outlines are sharper, making the overall image more clear. You can see the overall effect in the images below.

Currently, I’m going through another play-through of Borderlands 2 on the PC and I’m going to stick with it instead of continuing on with the Xbox 360. After enjoying the visuals, it’s just hard to go back.

I have a roommate who has been waiting for years to build a computer. He has it all speced out. But the one thing he has been waiting for is Kepler. No, I’m not talking about the German astronomer and… Continue Reading →

I have a roommate who has been waiting for years to build a computer. He has it all speced out. But the one thing he has been waiting for is Kepler. No, I’m not talking about the German astronomer and mathematician who was a key figure in the scientific revolution. I’m talking about Nvidia’s new line of graphics card based on the 28-nanometer architecture.

But the problem was that the new line of cards starting with the GeForce GTX 680 were a bit too expensive for him when the manufacturers launched the cards in March. Costing $499, they would have broke his budget or at least cost an arm and a leg. That’s a high price point for a graphics crade albeit a powerful one.

So he has waited and his patience appears to have paid off with today’s launch of the GeForce GTX 660 Ti. The midtier card is affordable at $299 and carries noticeable performance boosts. For those coming from a GeForce GTX 470, they’ll discover that the card is 1.8 times more powerful while those owning a Geforce GTX 260 will see a performance bump that’s 3.3 times more powerful, according to Nvidia’s Bryan Del Rizzo.

The graphics card measures in at 9 1/2 inches.

NOTABLE FEATURES: At a recent demo, Del Rizzo showed off what the GeForce GTX 660 Ti can do. He showed off the TXAA, a higher form of anti-aliasing that smooths out scenes. It removes the shimmer that comes when moving through environments. It usually appears near fencing or on windows. The effect of TXAA is similar to a image stabilization on a camera. It makes the world look more natural and less shaky.

The other notable feature is the PhysX technology, which puts the physics calculations on the card. What does this mean in terms of visuals? Well, there’s just a higher amount of fidelity in the world. The best example that Del Rizzo showed me was in Borderlands 2. The cloth reacts to gunfire, billowing out when the bullet goes through. The sparks that fly across the screen hit tables and fall off it instead of just being graphical garnishes that fall through objects as though they weren’t there. Players even get to see dynamic fluid that reacts like real water.

Compared to AMD’s top-of-the-line Radeon cards, Del Rizzo said the GeForce GTX 660 TI would be 20 to 30 percent more powerful. And with any graphics card worth its salt, the Nvidia cards will have overclocking software available. Surprisingly, for a card that powerful, the power consumption isn’t as intensive as you’d think. One of the goals card design was efficiency, he said, and because they don’t run hot, the cards are mostly silent.

From the sound of it, the GeForce GTX 660 Ti looks like a winner but I’ll have to get my hands on it and install it on my rig to see if it’s all legit.

EXTRA TIDBITSDel Rizzo said the card is about 9 ½ inches, which is much smaller than the AMD Radeon 6900 running in my computer right now. It barely fits in the midsize case I have. Also, as part of a deal with manufacturers and 2K Games, the purchase of a GeForce GTX 660 Ti includes a free download code for Borderlands 2 that activates when the game is released Sept. 18 . It’s a good way to show off the card’s power.

I previewed End of Nations a few weeks ago and came away impressed with the real-time strategy game that mixes MMO elements into its overall game. The best part about the upcoming title is that it will be free-to-play. I… Continue Reading →

I also mentioned that a beta would be coming. Well, thanks to NVIDIA and Trion, I have a few codes. Here are three:

GL9Z-TWWG-HRCK-2QGK-9PD6

6H3N-EC7D-6HPX-XTWR-F2HL

NL2N-MYTD-YD33-W6MZ-NL6L

The codes are for a closed beta that runs from Aug. 10 to 12. To start, head over to the End of Nations beta site here. I’ll also be giving out more beta codes through my social media pages on Twitter and Facebook. Give me a follow or a “Like” there.